


Glassed Coffee at the Tiara

by lunarpunctuation



Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Gen, Halo: Contact Harvest, Human AU, Modern AU, One Shot, coffee shop AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-21
Updated: 2018-04-21
Packaged: 2019-04-26 00:17:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14390130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunarpunctuation/pseuds/lunarpunctuation
Summary: The coffee shop AU about the tragic AIs from Contact Harvest literally no one wanted.





	Glassed Coffee at the Tiara

Sif sniffed as she watched her least favorite regular- the one who could barely contain his ogling- finally left the café, and then turned her best customer-smile towards the next patron. It was a nice enough attempt at happiness, but she couldn’t quite hide that she wasn’t really excited to see anyone, and had places she would rather be.

When the midmorning rush finally ebbed, Mack, the other barista, shook his head at her. “Lighten up a little, darlin’. One day your dream job will come and you'll ride off into the sunset with, leaving me forever to mourn. Enjoy it, make it fun. However it is Ice Princesses have fun.” He tipped the cowboy hat he wore for no reason- Sif knew he had never once touched a horse- and waltzed off to refill something from the back. No one else was in the store.

Sif started muttering as she began to straighten the cash in the till. “I didn’t major in Nordic history because I didn’t want to wind up at a coffee shop. I chose finance, I was smart, I was responsible. I hated practically everything but logistics. Spent thousands of dollars to run a cash register. And smile at people. Every. Day.”

“Be careful, Miss Christensen, someone important might hear you,” grumbled a deep voice.

Sif’s head shot up. “Mr. Johnson! Apparently our doorbell isn’t working again. The usual?”

“You know it.” Avery Johnson was a retired cop and came by every day to drink their semi-famous, strong, bitter, and spicy ‘glassed’ coffee and quietly make notes. Sif didn’t know what he was writing, but figured it was better not to ask – the former Sargent had been a local news sensation for a few gang shootouts.

She handed him his cup as the doorbell sounded and Mack stepped back into the room, arms loaded with supplies. “Well if it isn’t my evil twin, come to wreak havoc, and probably take my girl away, too.”

Sif shot a elbow into his plaid button-down. “I’m not your girl.”

The man sniffed. “Are you forgetting who got you this job, brother?”

“Loki, you may have introduced me Jilan, but I’m the one who had the experience and the local dairy connections, don’t start that again.”

Sif dulled her indignance. Mack may be an infuriating flirt, but Loki was cold and far too self-important, even if he was ‘old buddies’ with her boss. And somehow knew Mr. Johnson. She sometimes wondered if the little coffee shop wasn’t some sort of clandestine meeting destination, but that was probably boredom, she supposed, and another customer entered, diverting her attention as Mack and Loki’s conversation delved into angry whispers.

Loki finally got a drink and left the bar to… do whatever it was he did.

The quiet had returned, and Sif looked to Mack for something to do and a quip, but his normally joyful visage was as hard as his identical twin’s. She busied herself loading the dishwasher and tried to let him have his space, but after half an hour of silence, she cracked.

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” She asked, grinning at him. Misquoting Shakespeare was one of his many self-proclaimed talents, and her best shot at bringing the only source of any joy in her job… her major source of annoyance… her source of anything besides awkward silence back!

He smiled, not his usual, this one smaller, much softer. “Shall I compare thee to a winter’s day, Frostine the Snow Queen?”

They parried back and forth, verbally, until the soccer moms dying for their after-practice iced lattes started trickling into The Tiara.

It was half an hour until closing time when Jilan al Cygni strode into The Tiara confidently, because she did, in fact, own the place. She received a quick status update, and then went straight to the back room, with Loki and Mr. Johnson quietly following. The door closed, and Mack turned up the radio.

Sif was halfway through her regular closing procedures when Carly Rae Jepsen started blaring through the speakers. Mack popped in front of her, hand outstretched. “May I have this dance, your majesty?”

Sif waved him away. “If I don’t finish cleaning the coffee machine now, I’ll be out the door five minutes late.”

“This song is three minutes long, at most, what’s three minutes? There’s no one here, come on,” and he _beamed_ at her, as bright as the pearl snaps on his shirt. She wouldn’t admit it in a thousand years, but she melted, just a teeny bit, and took his hand.

He whirled her across the aged wooden floor, spinning her haphazardly before breaking down into ridiculous dance moves borrowed from decades past. She gave as good as she got, and they both delved into giggles on more than one occasion. As the song wrapped up, he took her hand again, spinning her into his arms. “They’re meeting because of rumors of the Insurrection flaring up again,” he whispered.

Sif froze. The Insurrection, or the Innies, was a street gang that had made Harvest the most dangerous city in the Midwest in the 90s. “They want to call Jilan and Johnson back to the police force, and Loki’s here to try and convince them,” he spun her out and back again, this time truly holding her in place. “And he wants me to sign up too.”

Her heart dropped. She was actively looking to leave the shop, but she hadn’t thought about not seeing Mack everyday, and he couldn’t leave her to go get himself shot in a gang fight! She pushed her out of his arms, “You shouldn't...”

The backroom door burst open, cutting her off. “Don’t bring that shit around again, Hemson. I’m not going back, no matter what. Take your evil out of here, there’s no sign that anything’s actually going to happen. Our city doesn't need more violence.” Johnson stormed out the door, and Jilan turned to Loki.

“He’s right. You don’t have the evidence, and definitely not to strike out on your own. Get out of here, take a vacation, you’re reading into things.”

The grim man didn’t even respond, just followed Johnson out the door, as if he hadn’t heard a single word.

“Finish closing up, and go ahead and head out. Mack, don’t worry about your idiot brother too much. He’ll calm down tomorrow, or I’ll send someone to make sure he does. And Sif, I don’t know what all you heard, but don’t worry. He’s full of smoke and piss and vinegar, he’s not a man made for peace and community development programs.”

Sif hated how audibly she let go of the tension and shock. “Thanks, ma’am.” She slunk around to the counter to finish her work as Jilan asked Mack a few business questions and left.

Mack and Sif were alone again, but the brief magic was over, someone had even turned the radio totally off.

She had finished her work when she finally spoke.

“If it was real, would you become a cop?”

Mack paused his task and looked straight at her. “Maybe. I almost signed up for the academy with him. I can’t sit and watch our people suffer again, even if I run the risk of becoming a nutjob like him.”

“Well, if you do, I’m coming with,” she said, surprising herself. “I’m good at supply chains, right? I could do something like that, be useful.”

He nodded. “I’m sure you could, but why?”

She blushed. “Maybe I hate watching people I care about suffer, too,” she finally said.

Mack strode towards her. “Is that so?”

Sif spoke, but as softly as possible. “Yeah, that’s how I feel.”

“Two years, and it takes a gang violence scare to get you to admit anything. There she is, that’s my girl.” He leaned towards her, and she froze as he softly pressed his lips to hers. He pulled back and murmured, “Good thing the boss doesn’t care about employee fraternization,” and this time, Sif kissed him.

Bonus:

A gathering of strange creatures coalesced behind the coffee shop- cockroaches, worms, a few birds, lizards, and rodents all gathered together. The three leaders spoke in unison. “We have successfully infiltrated the paperwork of the human Loki! We shall have these heathens heads soon! WE WILL BE THE CONQUERORS OF THE HUMANS, AND GO FORTH AND FOLLOW THE PATH TO JOIN THE FORERUNNERS-“

An exterminator in a strange helmet unleashed several high-tech pest control devices and the group was gone in the blink of an eye. He called up Jilan al Cygni on his headset. “We have the pest problem taken care of, ma’am. Yes, I am aware it was very quick, we here at Spartan Pest Control take our jobs very seriously.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I apologize for the lack of editing, I know the dialogue tags can be confusing but I read and fell in love with this book because of my now ex and it was his criticism and I don't really want to look at this anymore, so that's cool.


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